


A Knight on Horseback

by Maeve_of_Winter



Category: Archie Comics & Related Fandoms, Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Witchcraft, F/M, Family Issues, Magic, Witches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-26
Updated: 2017-10-26
Packaged: 2019-01-16 04:23:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,230
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12335412
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maeve_of_Winter/pseuds/Maeve_of_Winter
Summary: Cheryl is a witch who lives alone in the woods, with only her wolf familiar Sugar for company. But one day she encounters a wounded stranger on her property and decides to take him home.





	A Knight on Horseback

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fanetjuh](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fanetjuh/gifts).



> Thanks to everyone reading! If you ever want to chat, here's my [Tumblr](http://maeve-of-winter.tumblr.com/). I love discussion and hearing people's thoughts, so feel free to submit ideas or just talk Riverdale.

Once Cheryl would have sneered at the very notion of living in a cottage in the woods. She would have glanced distastefully at the scrubbed wooden floors and rough-hewn furniture before declaring the entire property a hovel.

“Outright barbaric,” she would have sniffed. “And hardly an ideal place for dances or dinners!” Her social calendar had been very important to her then.

Now, Cheryl was simply grateful to have a place to call her own. True, she couldn’t ignore her loneliness at times. Being the sole occupant of the isolated cottage was a stark contrast from her previous life at the center of high society. But it was refreshing to have a space where she could be free from prying eyes, safe from worry that her secrets were going to be uncovered.

Had she remained at her parents’ chateau, she would have lived her life in fear of her magic being discovered. An old noble family such as hers never would have accepted their bloodline being tainted with a born witch, and Cheryl had long been aware that her mother and father were unlikely to spare her any mercy if she were to bring scrutiny to their name. Clifford and Penelope Blossom were more concerned with reputation than anything else, and they would have seen her inheritance as a witch as a deliberate and unforgivable offense.

When her magic surfaced, her grandmother had realized what was happening before Cheryl did, the only witness to when Cheryl unconsciously transformed a bouquet of daisies (how plebeian) into a bouquet of long-stemmed roses. Though the old woman’s mind was mostly gone, ravaged by dementia, in a rare lucid moment she’d entrusted a small collection of magical items to Cheryl, but no explanation of how she’d come across them in the first place.

“You’ll have to leave,” Nana Rose told her in a raspy whisper, even though they were alone together in the room. “But take these with you when you do.”

She then handed Cheryl a small black pouch that seemed to glimmer in the light, and Cheryl did not have time to question the contents before her mother joined them in the parlor.

Thus, once Cheryl had realized exactly what her magic was, she’d covertly gathered supplies and a few books on sorcery that she’d managed to uncover. Then, after amassing as much of a stockpile as she could without catching notice, she’d fled in the night, travelling as long as possible before she finally found a village where no one knew nor cared who the Blossoms were. The black pouch was revealed to be charmed to hold much more than it appeared capable of, and the contents was an assortment of magical items, including a cauldron, a scrying glass, and numerous crystals.

Sometimes she wondered what said of her back at the chateau, if the servants gossiped that she’d fallen to scandal or eloped with a suitor. It angered Cheryl, that she would be remembered through such idle gossip rather than respect or wonder for her abilities, but she knew such ire was good for nothing, wasted on those outside her reach.

The only person whose opinion truly worried her was Jason. Her companion since birth, her best and truly, only, friend. Of all that she’d been forced to leave behind in her old life, she missed him the most. Though he’d been the one her parents had blatantly favored, treating him as if he were divine and her as though she were diseased, he had always been her protector, her defender. Sometimes she missed him with such aching that she thought she could cry for days, and other times she was so angry at the hand fate had dealt to her by separating the two of them that she wanted to scream until her throat was raw.

After all, a soothing throat tonic was the first potion Cheryl has taught herself to brew.

Would Jason, too, assume she had left in disgrace? Or did he question her departure and worry for her? Had he guessed the truth about why she left? Would he hate her for having magic, or would he remain fond of her?

In the back of her mind, in the deepest corner of her heart, Cheryl clung to a hope that she might see him again one day. She only allowed her thoughts to drift to the matter briefly before forcing it away, not wanting disappoint herself by daring to dream.

But what she would give to see Jason once more. Even if it were only to say goodbye.

* * *

The first warning Cheryl received was when she was brewing a new potion, one more complicated than anything she’d tried before. Thick steam rose from the simmering cauldron, she leaned forward, giving all of her attention to the detailed instructions of her spellbook.

The clanging of a bell resonated through the cabin, and Cheryl jumped right off of her stool, spilling a vial of hawthorn berry nectar down the front of her white gown. With an exasperated huff, she swiped her hand down the fabric and brought the marks to disappear. While she made a point of now eschewing her family’s colors and refusing to don anything red or black, there was the problem of white clothing accumulating stains at much quicker rate. She’d made a point to teach herself some basic household magic to take care of the issue.

Collecting herself, she swiftly moved to her scrying glass. Sugar, her white wolf familiar,  was ready at her side, hackles raised. The bell signalled a trespasser on her land; she’d constructed several protective circles around her cabin. The widest one sounded out a warning if anyone crossed into it, and the remaining three were actual barriers, shields that prevented anyone from approaching her home.

She caught her breath at the image in the glass: a lone rider, a man, slumped over a golden horse. The glass didn’t show his features with sufficient clarity for her to determine his identity, but her pulse quickened as she noticed his hair: red as a rose, almost the same uncommon shade as hers.

“Jason,” she breathed, and raced to the door, pausing only to grab a recovery potion from her stores.

Sugar bounded along beside her as Cheryl ran headlong to where the glass had shown him, her heart pounding frantically. As she spotted the horse, trepidation, excitement, and worry warred in her mind, but she pushed it all aside. First, she needed to focus on healing him.

Reaching the horse, she wasted no time in grabbing its reins and then walking to the side to see the rider’s face.

Her stomach plummeted, and devastation coursed through her.

It wasn’t Jason.

Instead, it was a stranger, with freckles dotting his face. Jason’s complexion had always been immaculate, as had her own.

In a moment of selfishness, she was tempted to leave him there, hating him, resenting him for not being Jason. He hadn’t come to find her; he was just an unfortunate traveler who’d been injured on his journey.

With a sigh, Cheryl turned to Sugar. “What do you think?”

Sugar just tilted her head and looked back at her. Cheryl had found her in much the same way, wounded and caught in a hunter’s trap. She’d freed her and taken her back to the cottage to apply a poultice to the wolf’s wounds, and then Sugar had remained with her ever since.

Putting her hands on hips, Cheryl tried to evaluate the situation. Never before had there been a visitor to her cottage. As far as she knew, no one was even aware she was living there. Were she to take the man back to her home, she could be exposing herself to a threat. But if she left him, he could have friends come to look for him, and they could uncover her hideaway and bring more trouble to her.

Heaving a sigh, Cheryl grasped the reins once more and began leading the horse toward her home.

“If you don’t appreciate my kindness, I’ll put a curse on you and all of your descendants,” she told the unconscious man in the saddle.

* * *

After hauling the red-headed stranger into her cottage, Cheryl retrieved the sleeping pallet from her tiny bedroom and settled him there in the main room. If she was going to attend to him, she needed to keep him close.

She was treating his injuries when he first awakened, blinking slowly as she gently bathed his chest, soaking some, thin wounds with a potion. A low groan emitted from his mouth, and then his opened his eyes, blinking up at her, his expression befuddled.

“Wha—what?” he muttered, staring at her and then glancing around.

His eyes were brown, Cheryl observed distantly. Not blue like Jason’s were.

“Hold still,” she ordered him, poking at his chest. “I need to make sure these wounds won’t become tainted.”

He frowned at her, puzzled. “Who are you?”

“Someone kind enough to take you into her home and care for you,” Cheryl informed him severely.

Finishing with cleaning the gashes, Cheryl applied bandages before standing and going over to her cauldron, which was now bubbling with a nearly completed strengthening potion. Reaching to the overhead rack from where she hung her bundles of herbs, she grabbed several heads of lavender and added them to the brew, before ladling a portion into a wooden cup and offering it to the stranger.

“Drink this,” she told him briskly. “It should help you. Maybe,” she added as the stranger sipped, “it will also strengthen your intelligence, and then you won’t go wandering onto another person’s land from now on.”

Swallowing the last of the potion, the red-headed stranger let out an amused huff. “Maybe you should give that advice to the bandits that waylaid me. I’m sure they would much appreciate it.”

Cheryl arched an eyebrow. “Bandits?”

“They ambushed me on the road from Riverdale,” the stranger confirmed. “I managed to fight them off, but as you’ve seen, I didn’t manage to escape unharmed.”

Riverdale. That was a week’s journey east of where her family’s chateau was located at Thornhill, while her cottage was a week and half’s journey north.

“You’ve travelled quite a ways to get here,” she remarked, even as suspicions formed in her mind. “What are you called?”

“Archie Andrews,” he responded promptly. “I’m travelling to Greendale to meet a friend of mine. She’s requested my aid, and I’m answering her summons.”

“How noble of you,” Cheryl replied drily.

But Archie did not respond to her sarcasm. “You must be noble as well. Not many would come to the rescue of a wounded stranger.” He gave her a smile. “Thank you for helping me.”

An odd feeling bloomed with Cheryl as he looked at her, and upon feeling her face warm she once again rose to busy herself at her cauldron. But years of manners being drilled into her head had her responding with an introduction in turn.

“My name is Cheryl,” she told him, only casting him the briefest of glances, as she lifted up a spellbook from the shelf to page through it.

She didn’t elaborate on the statement, but Archie seemed perfectly happy with it nonetheless.

“How long have you been practicing as a witch, Cheryl?” he asked without hesitation. “Sabrina—my friend in Greendale—has been learning since she was a child.”

Cheryl froze, fear flooding her veins, and she summoned her magical defenses. This was it then; she had finally been discovered. “Witch?”

“Well, yes.” Archie glanced around at her magical paraphernalia and shrugged. “Sabrina keeps similar items to help her with her spells. The similarities are fairly obvious.”

Cheryl blinked. “She practices magic? Freely?”

Archie seemed taken aback. “Do others not?”

Instead of answering the question, Cheryl simply took the cup back from him and placed it on her work table.

“The drink should help you get on the mend,” she told him.

“Could you tell me what my injuries are?” he asked. “You almost seem like a practiced physician.”

Cheryl lifted her chin proudly. “I’m better.” With her sensory magic, she could detect the locations and nature of maladies through only concentration, no examination required. “And by my estimate, you’ll need to rest a few days for those knife wounds to heal. None of them were deep, but you don’t want to reopen them.”

Archie nodded. “Thank you. Would I be intruding if I requested to remain here for those few days? You’ll be compensated for your trouble, of course.”

The request caught Cheryl off-guard. With her family, she’d been careful never to ask for anything, all too aware that either of her parents might leverage her wishes against her. Instead, she’d phrased her desires as sly suggestions or posited unwanted outcomes if they didn’t adhere to her plan. If she didn’t have a new gown to wear to the ball, there might be gossip that the Blossoms had fallen on hard times. If she didn’t attend the fox hunt as invited, she might acquire a reputation as uppity. And then she nearly always got her way. Her parents always had prioritized keeping up appearances, and made no secret of that they thought she should as well.

But while Cheryl was surprised by this simple, straightforward question, spoken plainly as Archie looked at her directly, she also considered it a welcome change.

“You’re welcome to stay the week,” she said graciously. “As for compensation, contributions to my healing supplies should be sufficient.

Archie gave her another smile, and a part of heart that Cheryl has thought long gone warmed at the gratitude on his face.

* * *

Though Cheryl had feared that Archie’s presence would be an irritant or a burden, she found that having another person in the cottage alleviated the bouts of loneliness that had been afflicting her. Sugar was a wonderful companion, of course, but not much of one for conversation.

“Why do you live all the way out here?” Archie asked as he peeled potatoes for their dinner. “You must have travel for two days just to reach the nearest market.”

“Some sacrifices have to be made to achieve solitude,” Cheryl informed him, not pausing in sprinkling spider venom into the enmity potion she was trying.

“But doesn’t it get tiresome?” he persisted. “Being here each day, rarely seeing another soul?”

“Sugar is here. And she’s enough for me,” Cheryl replied, and Sugar nudged her thigh with her head affectionately. “Besides, one doesn’t live in the middle of a forest if it’s company they seek.”

But his words resonated with her more than she’d like to admit. Truthfully, she did sometimes weary of the cottage, even though she typically prized having a place to call her own. But if there could be a compromise between her old life, brimming with engagements, and her new life, with nothing but her studies of magic to fill the long hours, she would prefer to partake in it.

As cautious as Cheryl had become, there was a disarming sincerity to Archie, and she found herself wanting to speak openly with him. But even when speaking less guardedly than usual, she remained wary.

“You mentioned your friend Sabrina is a witch,” she commented once night as he prepared their dinner and she prepared a spell. “Have you seen her use magic?”

She’d never met another witch before, and she was curious to hear of their talents.

“Of course,” Archie answered. “She’s very skilled. She can conjure food out of the air, or righten disorder with a word and a wish. She was raised by witches, so I suppose she has an advantage. She never had to learn on her own, like you. Her aunts were her teachers.”

A family of witches? Witchcraft being regarded with levity, welcomed rather than hated? It seemed impossible to Cheryl, but she found herself longing for such a life all the same.

“You aren’t afraid of Sabrina, then?” she asked. “For being a witch?”

“Why would I be?” Archie returned, and there was such honest confusion in his voice that Cheryl could not help but laugh, delighted by his unfeigned good nature.

As the week passed by, Cheryl marvelled at how comfortable it was to be there with Archie. She barely thought of him as a guest or a charge, instead just quickly adjusting to him as a fixture of the household. And she couldn’t deny that the lightness, the giddiness the flowed through her when she looked at him, wasn’t only due to gratitude at his fellowship. She didn’t just enjoy being with him for the time, she wanted to spend more time with him, and when the day of his departure arrived, her heart clenched at the prospect of never seeing him again.

After they finished their light breakfast of bread and cheese, she offered Archie a roughly carved wooden amulet.

“I’ve enchanted it for good fortune and protection,” she said, keeping her face composed and not allowing her sadness to show through. “Take it with you as a favor from me.”

Archie looked at her then and smiled, and she tried to suppress the ache that ran through her at the prospect of never again seeing his guileless brown eyes.

She had known him for only a week. But she was incredibly grateful just to be able to have a conversation, to be accepted for her magic and not judged.

Taking the amulet in his hand, he studied it for a moment, before glancing back up at her.

“What if you were to travel with me?” he asked suddenly. “You could met Sabrina. You would know more of your own. You wouldn’t have to stay here on your own anymore.”

Her heart leapt at the offer, but Cheryl still outwardly bristled. “Oh? You don’t think I like being on my own?”

“I think if you did, you wouldn’t be inviting whatever traveler wandered through to board with you,” Archie pointed out. “Think of it, Cheryl. You could come with me. Go out into the world and use your magic without care as to who recognizes it.”

Her heart beating wildly, Cheryl searched his face and found nothing but sincerity and kindness there, just as she always had. She desperately wanted what he was offering, to rejoin the world outside and once more be known, but she couldn’t hold back her fear that her magic would be met with distrust or menace. After all, that was how her parents would have regarded it.

But perhaps, by living with her magic a secret, hidden away from everyone else, she was keeping herself in the chains of their values, their standards, rather than breaking free and creating her own.

Lips tugging into a smile for the first time in a long time, Cheryl rose to find her black pouch and began gathering her belongings, Sugar trotting along beside her as she did.

“Ready your horse, Archie,” she told him, determination flowing through her. She would meet Sabrina and the other witches, and she would ascend to become the most powerful one of them. “I’m coming with you.”

Together, they started toward the door, Sugar following them, and on an impulse Cheryl reached out and grasped Archie’s hand, giving it a squeeze. And though he looked momentarily surprised, he did not hesitate to squeeze back.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to everyone reading! If you ever want to chat, here's my [Tumblr](http://maeve-of-winter.tumblr.com/). I love discussion and hearing people's thoughts, so feel free to submit ideas or just talk Riverdale.


End file.
